


At His Three

by BarqueBatch



Series: Continuum [4]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bucky Barnes Feels, Cloverfield crossover, POV Bucky Barnes, POV Steve, Protective Bucky Barnes, Seriously though when are there NOT Bucky feels?, Sniper!Bucky, Stucky Bookclub Challenge, minor gore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-22
Updated: 2014-06-22
Packaged: 2018-02-05 19:58:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1830373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BarqueBatch/pseuds/BarqueBatch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Baddies keep dropping dead around Steve, but can he get Bucky to finally come down from the rooftops and come home?</p><p>Prequel to "This Is A Shit Mission", but can be read as a stand-alone.<br/>I love LOVE Cloverfield and I'm not even a little sorry for the bit of crossover. :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	At His Three

“Ya know… I think the lizards were easier.”

Steve could only grunt his agreement as he avoided nearly being crushed by the tail of the skyscraper-tall monster that came out of the bay only two hours before. 

“Why can’t they invade LA once in a while,” Tony’s voice continued in his ear. “Why does it always have to be New York? This whole melting pot thing is just getting really outta hand-”

Tony’s voice cut off as he had to veer hard and fast to keep from being pulverized against Trump Tower. They were still at a loss for how to take this thing down. Nothing the military proper was lobbing at it made even a dent, except to truly piss it off more. Steve looked up just in time to leap away from the chunks of concrete raining down from the high-rise. Thankfully most civilians that were still in the buildings surrounding them had already fled. Steve caught random peeks of idiots cowering near buildings with their phones out and recording but he had to keep his focus on the creature towering nearly four hundred feet above him. If someone was trying to flee and needed his help, he’d be there, but these types he had to just leave to their own stupidity. 

More of Trump Tower slammed down into the street and Steve growled into his com. “Uh can you at least _try_ to pull its attention away from the really tall building, Stark?”

“Better Trump’s pretentious bit of penis envy than Joe’s Shanghai,” Tony answered with faux innocence oozing through the link. “He’s a dick with better insurance and he doesn’t make some of my favorite Chinese food.”

“Tony-” 

“Listen, Capsicle, Thor’s not back with Bruce yet and Mr. And Mrs. Smith aren’t due in for another half hour. It’s not like I can have some deep, philosophical conversation with this thing about its abandonment issues and lead it gently back into the sea so how about we chalk toupee boy’s tower up to an inevitable loss and try to keep it off Benihana’s and Nobu until Rhodey and the rest get here?”

“Did you even take a breath there, Stark,” Steve shot back as he grabbed one of the aforementioned stupid civilians, tossed his phone into the rubble and hauled him away from the corner of Trump Tower just as another blast of debris plummeted.

“Tongue’s gotta keep up with the brain, Cap.”

“I’m only gonna thank you for that visual if throwing up on this thing gets it to retreat,” Steve groaned as he shoved his freshly-rescued idiot down the section of Fifth Avenue that wasn’t buried. “Get to the park,” he yelled, brooking no argument. “I see you here again and I’ll pulverize you myself!”

“Ooh, temper, Steve,” Tony crooned as he rocketed overhead. “Your poster boy persona’s slipping there.”

“Yeah well,” Steve gasped as a falling chunk of building hit his upturned shield, “people have to wanna help themselves. The ones that don’t– What the…!”

He was suddenly knocked sideways by a clicking, gurgling thing the size of a doberman, except twice as heavy. He’d kept his grip on his shield, thank God, but this thing was relentless. Its jaws were immense and snapping almost faster than he could block. Tony was yelling into the comlink at him but none of his words were computing at all as Steve struggled to gain the upper hand. He felt the sharp joints of its exoskeleton straining the armored fabric of his uniform and knew this was a one-on-one he needed to end fast.

And then it was over.

The only sound Steve heard to signal the sudden change was something akin to shattering bone, then the creature was jolted sideways. It shuddered violently then collapsed lifelessly onto its side. 

“About time your goth guardian boyfriend showed up,” Tony drawled into Steve’s ear. “You okay?”

Despite his annoyance, Steve couldn’t even be bothered to volley back any barbs as he rolled onto his knees then stood, albeit with a bit of a wobble. He stared down at the creature, whose head had splintered into five different pieces. Only one person could make a shot like that without taking Steve out in the process. He raised his eyes to the approximate origin of trajectory but even his enhanced vision found no giveaway of the Winter Soldier’s position. 

Except Steve refused to call him that, despite vehement, worried warnings that there might not be much of Bucky Barnes left there. Steve would angrily disagree. He knew the horror in those previously glacial eyes belonged to Bucky alone, and he knew the Winter Soldier wouldn’t have pulled him from the Potomac if his own volition. This would be the fourth time now that his silent sniper showed up to pick off anything that got too dangerous. He never engaged directly, moving fluidly from one high perch to the next to keep Steve within his rifle’s sight. Adversaries would drop around Steve like flies until there were no more left to swat, and then he would disappear again before Steve could reach out to him. It swelled his heart in his chest even as it made him ache. This was Bucky clawing his way back, though his insistence of keeping Steve at a distance was beyond painful. 

“Cap!”

Tony’s warning made Steve duck and roll instinctively but he needn’t have worried. The bug-like creature was rolling across the ground, dead long before it came to a stop. Steve looked back to the rooftop above and touched his temple in silent salute. It was all he could do before two more came at him. One dropped immediately. His shield knocked the other one around until Bucky got the shot he wanted. And so it went for another ten minutes; Bucky dropping the chittering creatures and Tony plying him with Grade A Stark Snark as he continued to look for a way to deal with the behemoth slowly taking out lower Manhattan.

The last bug that attacked Steve caught him from behind. All he could do was clap his shield into its clip on his back and tuck his head beneath. Two of his ribs cracked from the force of the snapping blows the creature was leveling at the shield in an attempt to bite him. He felt the creature shift and then a searing pain lit through his hip. Movement stopped and the thing became dead weight atop him. He rocked sideways and cried out at the fiery burn, but it did the trick and the creature slid from atop his shield. He looked down at his hip and saw the blood seeping into his uniform. Below him was a sizable hole in the pavement where the slug had exploded its encased shrapnel outward. An inch to the right and that hole would have been his hip. Even the super soldier serum probably wouldn’t have saved him from bleeding out had that exploded inside him instead of at him. Steve rolled onto his back and put pressure to the wound as he kept a weary eye on his surroundings. Tony zoomed by him and his voice crackled in Steve’s ear again.

“That was the burliest thing I’ve ever seen. How the hell does he do that? Could he do that before the super steroids and uber Geritol… because that was truly beautiful even though you caught blast… You’re gonna be okay, right? Your Geritol’s even better than his, yeah? Hey, if we’re a super secret boy band, does that make him your Justin Timberlake because he’s dropping everything dead around you? Oh wait, maybe Justin Bieber. I know I’d drop dead if Bieber touched me-”

“Stark… shut up,” Steve gritted, trying to block out the pain.

“God, you’re such a grouch when you’ve got a boo boo,” Tony deadpanned. “If you can pull out of your super funk for a minute, I think I might’ve found something…”

“I’m listening,” Steve sighed as his eyes darted to the streak of gold and red that passed overhead.

“This thing is purely organic so no flying down its throat for me, but it blows out these air sacs on either side of its head when I truly piss it off. If I could get it to do it again, I could see if a missile will do any damage there. It’s all I got at the moment; only possible soft spot I've seen so far.”

“Worth a try, Tony,” Steve winced as he tentatively sat up. “I’ll cross my fingers down here.”

"Maybe cover your testicles too," Tony advised hesitantly. "These are a new payload..."

"We are _not_ discussing anything below my waist, Stark," Steve grimaced, too skeeved out to even be overly concerned about Tony's new experimental missiles and what might actually be in them this time.

To his left, another mini terror skittered toward him only to have its front flank blown apart. To his disgust, the jaws continued to snap at him even then. It tried to push itself toward him before two of its four eyes were gone along with half of its head. He’d have to ask Tony what type of slugs Bucky was likely using because they were damn effective on those exoskeletons. Even if they brought the big bad down, these things were everywhere and who knew how far they’d travel from their host. The thought of those loose in the subway tunnels was a stomach dropper.

Above him, Tony had clearly just done something to instigate a deafening roar from the beast. Steve managed to pull himself to his feet as he looked upward. The blazing speck that was Iron Man loosed two missiles at the seemingly delicate air sac then banked sharply away. Part of the sac was violently shredded and the creature rocked sideways.

“Hey, if those are ears…” Steve began.

“Then I just fucked with its equilibrium,” Tony finished. “Even if they're not, I'm betting there's something important behind them and that’s either gonna be really good or-”

His words were drown out even with the com in Steve’s ear as the creature staggered into the building opposite Trump Tower then started weaving down 57th Street. Tony’s voice finally rose above the thundering steps of the giant as Steve jogged painfully after it. 

“No no, not the Four Seasons. I actually like the Four Seasons! They have this apple-lime-yuzu bubble tea that takes me to a happy place and the apple lobster carpaccio! I need that in my life and they wouldn’t give me the recipe last time I asked for it-”

Another horrific roar and explosion as Tony took another desperate shot. Another crab-dog-parasite fell to Steve’s right but the shot was messier this time.

“Sorry, Buck,” he muttered, knowing his protector would need to do some serious repositioning now. That was the last semi-casual thought Steve managed to have before he realized the creature had pivoted and was falling sideways right toward him. With his injury still hobbling him, there was no way he could move fast enough to fully get away from the bulk about to land on him. He caught a glimpse of Iron Patriot tailed by four jets before he jerked his shield up and prepared for the worst.

************************************************************

Not the kitchen table. He couldn’t sit there. The last kitchen table he sat at belonged to Pierce and that was just not a memory he cared to dwell in. They were coming back at a more manageable frequency now, the memories. There was still no rhyme or reason to how they came back though, nor was there any certainty of how he would react when they hit. Sometimes the pain was crippling. Other times they floated past in a dreamlike manner; a shiny mylar balloon of helium-filled emotion. Those usually had to do with Steve before the war. Those he relished even when they confused him. They were soothing and gentle despite the occasional fist fight or split lip. The peppering of physical altercations were laughable and childlike compared to what he’d come to know as Hydra’s asset. Steve’s smile was still naive and open, his eyes soft and fond as they stared into his own.

The part of him that had been repressed and asleep for so long was awake now and snatching at every foothold it could gain. The name Bucky still felt odd most days, but he no longer felt entirely disconnected from it as he had that day at the Smithsonian. Bucky Barnes had stared back at him like a stranger, but then he began to walk along behind Winter. That had been the most disconcerting period of time with memories and feelings flitting about just beyond his peripheral.

Then Bucky began to walk along closer to his side, and now he kept feeling a gradual merging. Things familiar to the asset began to shift in his perceptions, their hues becoming more vibrant as Bucky’s eyes saw them anew. 

Which was why he couldn’t bear to be too close to Steve just yet. When he looked through his rifle scope, things were not complicated or open to his chaotic, confused perceptions. There was one job, one mission, and that was to annihilate anything that posed a serious threat to Steve Rogers. If Steve’s stealth suit suddenly looked eerily red, white, and blue to his struggling brain, it didn’t matter; the shot was still the same. Blink hard enough and the midnight blue would return while the rest of his brain worked out trajectories and soft spots. The stabilizers in his cybernetic arm kept the kick of the rifle from his shoulder and allowed his shots an even deadlier accuracy. The grip and trigger warming under his right hand was a comfort, something deeply ingrained long before the programming. Sad as it was, the times he watched over Steve with his long-range rifle were the times he felt most at peace.

He’d just picked up one of Steve’s sketch pads when he heard a rustle of fabric behind him. He didn’t startle or spin around to a defensive stance. Only one person could walk this far into the apartment without his heightened hearing picking up any sound. The sharp intake of breath only confirmed it.

“Bucky…”

He didn’t look up at Steve’s shocked voice, his eyes remaining fixed upon the young man captured in graphite. His own eyes looked back at him, yet they couldn’t have been more different. Those eyes were bright and arrogant as they peered out from beneath a flatcap. They held humor and wonder… and love.

“You were reckless down there.” The accusation was level, rolling flatly past his lips.

Steve’s pack dropped to the floor and his shield clinked softly as he rested it against the wall. “Well you know how I am when I’m left to my own devices,” he sighed.

The returned accusation hit its mark and he winced at the hurt in Steve’s voice. “I can’t protect you when you run off half-cocked.”

“Then maybe you should come down from the rooftops,” Steve countered quietly. “I’m fine with you being out of danger but I’d rather have you beside me again.”

He set the sketch pad down and looked out the window where dawn was finally creeping over the horizon. He needed to leave soon. He needed to change back into civilian clothes and blend back into the populace that no one paid attention to if they could help it.

“No.”

“Why not, Buck? Help me out here. I want to understand why you won’t let me help you.”

Anger welled up within him as he picked the sketch pad back up and turned to toss it onto the coffee table between them. “You still see this kid when you look at me. That isn’t me-”

“No, it isn’t,” Steve cut in quickly. “Not anymore. He’s still a part of you but you stopped being that kid long before you fell, Buck. You think you hid it well but I saw it. I know you better than anyone-”

“Not anymore,” he gritted.

“Bullshit,” Steve spat back at him, the swear making him blink. A ghost of memory floated past his eyes of Steve in a brown leather jacket and helmet... eyes aflame with anger after someone tried to tell him that a group of men couldn’t be saved. Men somewhere near Belgium...

“Bucky, look at me.” Steve’s firm command caused the memory to evaporate before he could grasp more of it. He slowly raised his eyes to Steve’s and the pain he felt in his chest was immediate and nearly suffocating.

“Your… handlers…” Steve’s lip curled into a hateful snarl at the word and his eyes narrowed. “They know your programming. They know what they did to you. They know what they tried to instill in you… but the minute you saw me it all started to crumble. Even away from me it kept falling apart. They built upon a foundation that would always crack and give way. That’s why they had to keep wiping your mind… because the man I watched fall from that train in the Alps is a stubborn, stupid jerk that they could never keep down indefinitely. He will always get back up if you knock him down-”

“Like that punk ass kid in Brooklyn,” he countered as images of scrawny Stevie flashed before him.

“Yeah,” Steve nodded, taking the jab fully in stride. His eyes softened and he lifted his hands in a pleading gesture. “Bucky… please. Just… Just let me in.”

“When I remember things… sometimes it’s… it’s not…” He looked down at the floor and squeezed his eyes shut. “It’s violent and painful… I look around me and I’ve trashed everything. I don’t even remember doing it. I’m a danger to anyone around me when it happens. You can’t be around for that. No one can.”

“Maybe you didn’t notice that I’m still here even after you shot me three times on the helicarrier, Buck.”

The words hit him hard in the gut as he opened his eyes. He’d been so careful to avoid looking at Steve until he'd commanded it and then he could only manage to look into his eyes. He’d failed to notice the ragged hole in Steve’s uniform. Of course after being dug out from under a fallen aquatic monstrosity, there wasn’t much of his uniform that hadn’t taken a serious beating. Waiting in the shadows while Stark and the group of Army grunts dug Steve out had been agonizing but he couldn't risk the military taking him into custody. Being held captive was still being held captive, regardless of the people's intentions. He couldn't do that again; he couldn't relinquish his freedom again.

Steve saw the anguish in his eyes as he fixated upon the healing patch of reddened, puffy skin and waved his hand dismissively. “Barely stings now.”

“Yeah, what the fuck were you thinking even being down there to begin with? I wouldn’t need to be gambling with your life trying to save you from overgrown beetles if you’d steered clear altogether. Were you planning on flinging your damn shield and maybe giving it a migraine? What did you even think you were going to accomplish against that shit?”

“Anything I could, Buck. I saved a lot of lives down there and Tony needed my help…”

“Stark,” he growled, turning back to the window. “Idiot just like his old man.”

“That’s definitely the Bucky I know,” Steve grunted with a bit of amusement. “You and Howard never did get along because you were so damn protective of me-”

“He helped you get yourself into too much shit.”

“He helped me rescue you,” came Steve’s simple reply. “And you didn’t gamble with my life out there tonight, Buck. Your shot was perfect. Anyone else might’ve lodged that slug into me rather than the pavement and then this conversation wouldn't be happening at all.”

“Because you’re an idiot too... with no self-preservation skills to speak of.”

“Why would I? I always had you watching my back.”

He heard Steve take a couple of steps toward him and turned to give him a warning look. Steve stopped, his hands again held slightly aloft. “Look… my point here is that you don’t need to worry about me when you have these memory flashes, Buck. I’m no wilting flower. If I can survive you actively trying to take me out, there’s not going to be a problem with me dodging a couple of flailing fists, even if one is metal. Don’t do this alone. You don’t have to anymore.”

_The thing is… ya don’t have to…_

“I’ll give you all the space you need, Buck, I swear it. I know you’re deadly to anyone that comes after you but that doesn’t stop me from worrying about you. C’mon man… do my gut a favor and stop giving me heartburn all day. There’s plenty of room here… all ya gotta do is take out the trash or-”

“I’m not shining your shoes,” he cut in flatly, though inside his chest his heart fluttered wildly.

“The only time I need that is for Tony’s functions and he has people for that.”

“I’m not doing his functions.”

“I would never ask you to.”

“Do I have to be nice to him?”

Steve pondered that for a moment. “Civil would be good. You’re gonna need your arm maintained and repaired at some point and he’s the best person I know to do it… although if you tell him I said that, I’ll deny it.”

Silence held between them as he weighed his options. He was tired of the shadows. He was tired of feeling adrift. He was tired of feeling like redemption would never be within his reach.

“I have a lot to atone for,” he whispered. Steve opened his mouth as if to argue but he raised his eyes fully in warning. Steve bit off his instinctual words and shook his head.

“I know you feel that way, Buck… but you’re a good man. Even doing Captain America’s dirty work, you were still a good man. Darker, yeah, but you knew where to draw the line. You still do. All you gotta do is keep being a good man. The rest will take care of itself in time.”

When Bucky didn’t answer immediately, he spoke again with more firmness to his tone. “Feeling like you deserve to move on and find some sort of peace again is going to be the hardest part, but I’m here to keep reminding you until you believe it.”

He let his eyes drift about the comforts of Steve’s apartment. He didn’t remember what a hot shower felt like. Had he ever even had one? How would it feel to curl up in a blanket on the couch while rain spattered the windows? How would Steve’s coffee smell when not mixed with the scent of wet foliage and gunpowder? How would it feel to have someone to talk him out of the nightmares rather than waking up shivering and alone?

“Okay,” he whispered, his voice cracking with the relief he felt saying the word. A feeling was blooming within him, one that he’d long forgotten. It felt like safety and comfort. It felt like it could be home.

Steve only smiled and moved forward to slowly pull him into a hug. He tensed for a moment but then every muscle in his body seemed to remember. He wrapped his arms around Steve and let his eyes fall closed as his breath huffed out of his lungs. He wasn’t okay yet… but now he was starting to believe eventually he could be.

“Welcome home, Bucky.”


End file.
